BROOKLYN, N.Y. – Rick Glenn might not have been the faster fighter against Phillipe Nover, but as he proved in his octagon debut, he was tough enough to take his lumps and turn the fight into a grind.

After dropping the opening frame to Nover’s (11-8-1 MMA, 1-6 UFC) slick striking, Glenn (19-4-1 MMA, 1-1 UFC) stuffed the “The Ultimate Fighter 8” vet into the cage and battered him with elbows and knees to secure a split-decision win.

The featherweight bout was part of the preliminary card of today’s UFC 208 event at Barclays Center in Brooklyn N.Y. It streamed on UFC Fight Pass ahead of additional prelims on FS1 and a main card on pay-per-view.

Two of three judges saw the fight 29-28 for Glenn, who picked up his first UFC win after a lopsided decision loss against Evan Dunham in his promotional debut. Like that debut, Glenn took punishment before getting into the fight, taking a pair of high kicks to the head that might have dropped other fighters. He kept going and turned up the pressure in the second.

As Nover struggled to find counters, Glenn advanced into the clinch and worked inside with knees and elbows. After dropping the middle frame, Nover came out in the third with a more fierce attack, working a left hook that had success early. But again, Glenn was able to press him to the cage and take away the striker’s weapons. By the end of the round, Nover was fading as Glenn landed big shots inside.

“I think I did enough to win all the rounds tonight,” Glenn said. “It was a close fight, but I feel like it should’ve been unanimous. I didn’t want to let it go to decision with him being a hometown guy, so I feel like I could’ve done more out there to get the finish. But I’m happy to leave with a win. I was really surprised in his defense against the cage. I wasn’t able to get him down the way I wanted to. He just popped right back up, and I didn’t expect that.”

Never drops to 1-2 in his second UFC stint after going winless in a three-fight post-“TUF” run.